Many retailers attempt to sell goods or services to potential customers with a guarantee that the retailer is offering the lowest price. If the customer makes a purchase from the retailer and finds that a competitor of the retailer is offering the product or service at a lower price and the customer can provide proof of the competitor's lower price, then the retailer will refund or rebate the difference between the purchase price and the competitor's lower price. The retailer's price matching policy is an attempt to encourage prospective buyers to purchase goods immediately and without checking competitors for lower prices. For purchases from multiple retailers, a customer must visit each retailer with proof of lower prices by competitors in an attempt to collect a refund from each retailer.
Theoretically, a retailer's price matching policy attempts to simplify customer purchases by allowing customers to buy any item from the retailer with customer having the security of knowing that the customer is paying the lowest price in the market for that product or service. Unfortunately, the conventional price protection program places a heavy burden on customers such that they must: (1) continually monitor advertisements for lower prices, (2) save a qualifying advertisement as evidence of the lowest price offer, (3) bring the advertisement to the original retailer, and (4) fill out a claim form with the appropriate information. Moreover, not all retailers offer price matching policies. There are no conventional computer systems that can track this comparative pricing data upon a purchase by a customer and generate a request to pay the customer when a lower price has been identified.
A need, therefore, exits for an improved program that provides a customer with the lowest available price, wherein the program applies to any retail item purchased by the customer, no matter which retailer sold that item. Moreover, there is a need for a program wherein every purchase by a customer can be automatically tracked to determine the existence of a lower advertised price with an option to have a claim form or payment file automatically generated and provided to the customer in the event of a lower price offer.